Lyra sees a ghost
by LeeAndHester
Summary: Not really a ghost, more like a memory. But Lyra sees a memory doesn't sound quite as good, does it? WillLyra fluuuuuff! Spell checked. Please Review.
1. Default Chapter

My first HDM fanfic- FLUFFY  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own HDM. I am only in love with them.  
  
Chapter One  
  
Lyra Silvertongue sighed as the heavy Asian man with the thick grey mustache sat down next to her on the green park bench.  
  
"How did you find me this time, Mr. Yomani?"  
  
"It's not hard, Lyra. Every year on this day you're discovered missing, and every time, we find you here. Why here, Miss Belacqua? The Botanical Gardens are not especially beautiful this time of year."  
  
Pantalaimon blinked his golden eyes, shrouded by fur, at Mr. Yomani's turtle daemon, DaBorgene, who had stuck her wrinkled head out of his pocket.  
  
"Mr. Yomani, we agree to the same thing each year. You will let me sit here until four-thirty, at which time you will take me away. In return, I promise to turn all my work in this semester."  
  
"A deal's a deal, Miss Belacqua. I expect you to hold up your end of it."  
  
As the school principal shuffled away, Lyra yelled, "and that's Miss Silvertongue to you!" She showed him her slender middle finger.  
  
Lyra got back to the business of telling Will all about her life without him, trying not to sound too miserable, while at the same time letting him know how much she missed him. Every so often, Pantalaimon would interject some small bit to Kirjava, such as 'I hate having a fixed form' and 'how are you coping in a place where nobody can see you?' Lyra talked endlessly about the most trivial of things, like her badminton squad. Every so often, she would be perfectly still and close her eyes, imagining that he was with her on the bench, replying eagerly to her questions, and asking his own, telling his own stories. As she saw Mr. Yomani exit the coffee shop across the street where he always had a donut before taking her back to boarding school, she uttered the words that she always did when it was time to leave  
  
"I hope you are happy, Will, because you deserve it. I hope that everything is going your way, and that you have forgotten about me, because the memory of me will only make you unhappy."  
  
And for one split second before she left, she thought she saw, out of the corner of her eye, the most beautiful cat she had ever seen.  
  
"Lyra....."  
  
Stay tuned, and R+R, please. Sorry its so short, but I'm in seventh grade, and I HAVE HOMEWORK, PEOPLE!!! GASP! Next chapter: Hello Lyra, Hello Will 


	2. Kirjava Speaks Short Chapter

"Kirjava?" Lyra flushed in anticipation. It was as if time had stopped. In fact, time HAD stopped. Mr. Yomani was halfway out of the donut shop, chocolate old-fashioned stuck between his teeth. Leaves were suspended halfway between the branch and sidewalk. Cars were still, their drivers paralyzed. The little cat walked up to Lyra. She leaped onto the bench, and, ignoring Lyra herself, spoke directly to her daemon. "I've come to warn you..." the image of Kirjava flickered, as if fading. "Scientists in another world have learned about dust and..." the cat was hardly visible... "they are going to destroy the barriers. Will is fixing the knife..." the cat all of a sudden turned it's head at something invisible to Pantalaimon and Lyra. It disappeared.  
Time started again. Mr Yomani eased the speechless Lyra into the empty schoolbus and started the motor. "That was a delicious donut."  
"Oh, Pan, what can we do?" 


	3. Chapter 3: Mayann

Lyra braced herself for what she knew waited for her within the dormitory. She curled her fingers tight around Pan's hair, hanging on, but not enough to hurt him. Taking a deep breath, she stepped inside.

"Hey look, it's Looney Lyra! How was your little visit with your lover? Does he have a new look? Oh, that's right, he's INVISIBLE! Ha-haa-ha!" Lyra had never considered herself a lousy judge of character until a couple of years ago. Freshman year she had made friends with a girl named Mayann who had been sympathetic. Lyra had, late one night, been so overcome that she told Mayann everything. She told the entire school and now Lyra was friendless and considered to be crazy. After the girls had gotten tired of taunting the girl who never responded and always had a stubborn, yet eerily strong expression about her roundish face, Lyra was mostly left alone. Except for this day each year, that is. The price of meeting Will was taking extra classes and being made fun of mercilessly.

"Why don't you just go to another world, freak? Go on, fly away!" Lyra liked to think that she wouldn't have trusted Mayann these days, but she couldn't know. Although she was large and intimidating (she was captain of the field hockey team), Her face was kind and welcoming.

Suddenly, there was a great sound at the door, like the sound of someone very strong attempting to knock but in effect nearly breaking down the door. Thankful for a distraction, however frightening, Lyra rushed to the door and flung it aside. Waiting patiently as a great dog on the other side was...

...Iorek Byrnison.

Sorry for the randomosity of the updates. I'm now an overloaded 8th Grader.


	4. Will and Kirjava

Will closed slammed the door of the flat and sank to his knees inside of it. He opened the parlor window, which he did every day to let Kirjava hop in and out as she pleased. Today she was waiting just on the other side. She popped inside and curled into a warm, sunny spot, baring her stomach so Will could give her a belly rub. She nuzzled his fingers for a while, then sat up to lick at his chapped lips. "You need to take better care of yourself. Just look at you. All this dust business is making you crazy. You haven't shaved in a week, your hair is dirty as the city dump, and those clothes are shot to hell. You need to shower. Right now."

Will was accustomed to be told what to do by his daemon, so he went into the tiny bathroom and emerged half an hour later wet, clean-shaven, and dressed in fresh clothing. He reclined on the scuffed floor and stared at her pensively. He had picked up a habit of running his left thumb and forefinger over his chin, and was doing so now. "So tell me again what's going on and why I must fix the knife." Will spoke softly, too softly for a boy such as he. Any person could see that, at seventeen, he had already experienced disaster in his life. He has wise, sad eyes that did not fit his form. He had been asked for dates many times in recent years, and had declined them all. He knew that he had promised to move on, but how could he? Every time he closed his eyes, he saw her face. It had become painful for him, being in love with this, this, this phantom! It had been four years, could he never stop this love? He was very upset at the thought of seeing her again. He didn't want to. It would hurt him just that much more to say goodbye again.

All of this Kirjava understood, and his sadness was also her sadness. But nothing could be done. "Powerful scientist-magicians in the world of Salinell have learned about all that happened in Lyra's world. For reasons not yet clear, they wish for the borders between worlds to be erased. They are weakening them yet. And once erased, they can never be replaced. All of this is being worked on by the doctor."

"But why is this bad? We would be with Lyra and Pan forever!"

"Think about it, you moron. You don't see because you don't want to see. What am I made up of? What is Pan made up of? What is that special part of everyone made of, created by? Dust! They're destroying dust! You destroy dust, you destroy everyone's souls! Remember the people who the specters took in Citigazze? You will be as them, and I, I will be gone! It's already happening at the poles! Look!" Kirjava thrust an excited paw at the newspaper on the ground. The headline ran 'All Inuit Peoples Die Under Mysterious Circumstances'.

"But why must I fix the knife?"

"So we can go get Lyra and then" Kirjava had that gleam in her eye that she got when she was reaching her point on something "We leave for Salinell."

As usual, her enthusiasm rubbed off on Will. "I will fix the knife." His voice was louder, stronger this time. More like the voice he had left when he left Lyra.

I kind of wrote this one right after chapter 3 because they go together- I kind of had to explain to myself why Iorek Byrnison was behind the door. I might need to reread the trilogy before I write any more, to brush up on my HDM. I haven't read them in a couple of years... they always make me cry. I promise (don't trust me though) to have the next chapter out by mid-January. I kind of write these things one-shot though, so when I'm in that writing mood... Please tell me which character you'd most like to see in the coming chapters.

Book recommendation by author: Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs. Not for young readers.


	5. Will's Story TGC to Present

Chapter 5

Will's Story

Fixing the knife would not be as hard as Will had expected.

After Will returned to his own world for what he had thought the final time those years ago, he had taken care of his mother, who, shortly after, had died. For a period of a month, Will stayed in their house alone, dejected. He blamed Lyra. If he had never met her, he reasoned to himself, his mother would still be alive. He should have taken care of her! For a week and a half, he wouldn't even talk to Kirjava.

Soon, however, he had to return to school, or people would come to his house and find out that he was alone. Acting through the kind neighbor who had watched his mother, Will went through his mother's accounts. Among them was a large sum left to them by his father, which she had apparently forgotten. With the woman's help and Mary Malone's, he had himself legally declared an emancipated minor and sold his house. Selling the place of his childhood was the hardest thing he'd ever done, short of leaving Lyra. With the fortune he had acquired, he was able to rent a small, unfurnished flat near the University, within walking distance of the American-style high school he would attend.

If Will had thought himself a quiet, reserved boy before, one who blended with the crowd and was never seen, he was more so now. He was never once called by name for his entire first year. Using his cleverness, Will managed to take all his college credits in his first two years of school. Now, in his last year, he was taking only Metal Shop and a subject titled Contemporary Thought which he never attended.

He went to the school's metal-shop room on a bleak, gray Sunday afternoon with a heavy bundle wrapped in flannel in his rucksack. He stepped in quietly and closed the door behind him.

I sort of wrote this chappie to explain what Will was doing for the last five years and how it was that he thought he would be able to fix the knife without the bears' help. I know it's a bit boring. More interesting chappies soon, I promise!

The next chapters will be: Lyra and Iorek, then Mary Malone explains to Will (she's already spoken to Kirjava, obviously) about Salinell. :)


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